


Haunted

by Wenzel



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: M/M, SORT OF Reaper76, and gore at the end, gabe is Spooky, ghost au, warning for homophobic language in the story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-11
Updated: 2017-09-11
Packaged: 2018-12-26 16:26:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12062748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wenzel/pseuds/Wenzel
Summary: A ghost lives in Jack's new apartment, and it has something it wants him to do.





	Haunted

**Author's Note:**

> Warning for homophobic language from some Not Good people in the story.

A ghost haunted his new apartment. At least, Jack  _ thought _ it was a ghost. If it was a demon, he’d have to bring in a priest, and the only priest he knew was from when he was a kid and Father Martin had reamed him for playing Pokemon at service. 

“You should be terrified,” Ana told him. “It’s a ghost. It could hurt you.”

“I  _ am _ terrified,” he said in return. “But I’m trying not to let it get to me. It’s not like I can move again.” Not after bailing on his shitty frat brothers. He still got texts from them, alternating between insults and asking him to come back. They refused to believe he never would. 

_ Dude, it was just a joke. We were having a great time and then you blew it. Look, we’re willing to forget what happened. Your room is still empty.  Just come back. Joseph’ll even buy those shitty coolers you like. _

The first few he’d replied to. Mostly in the vein of telling them to get fucked. But he’d given up after Joseph had flipped at him again. Jack, Joseph said, was an oversensitive queer who needed to get over himself. Jack thought Joseph was an ugly fuck whose personality matched his face. It wasn’t like there was a middle ground he could take between ‘my frat was full of bigoted assholes’ and ‘I’m going to stay because they give me alcohol and a place to stay’. Jack would rather work more shifts than endure their company for the rest of the semester.

And if that made him an oversensitive pansy, fine. He’d take the ghost over people making jokes about ‘fruits’. It was just sometimes hard to remember that when he lay in bed and footsteps crept through the slender, winding hallways of his apartment.

It’d all started with a face that kept appearing in his dreams. It’d once been human, he thought. The lines of its face were broad and long, strong as steel but eaten away by shadow. Glistening white teeth were visible through the rotten skin. From dark eyes spilled midnight’s essence. The ghost reached out with skeletal fingers and touched Jack’s warm, fleshy cheek.

He’d woken with a burn mark imprinted on his skin. The first time, he wrote it off. The second, he searched for a source of heat he could have pressed against. The third, he slathered the burn in ointments and pretended everything was all right. 

He’d signed the lease for twelve months. The landlord had been gruff and suspicious. Any damages, he was out. If he left the apartment, he’d be penalized by contract. And if he dared sublet, the landlord would see him in court. Excuses that the place was haunted wouldn’t stand up in court.

Jack counted himself as a popular person. He worked in student government, and most of the people he’d taken classes with knew him by name, even years later. But there was a difference between liking someone and housing them. The only two people he counted on for that were Ana and Reinhardt, who shared a tiny apartment of their own. But he couldn’t justify to himself more than a night a week, even if Ana and Reinhardt offered more.

“It’s not that bad,” he’d tell them as Ana rechecked his bandaged face. Her time as a resident was almost over, and she’d learned all the tricks of burn care after a year in the ER. “Creepy, sure. But the occasional burn isn’t anything to worry about.”

“Except that it’s thickening the skin,” Ana said, “and scarring. You’re on your way to permanent discolouration.”

The pain of the burns had become less and less intense, probably because of the scar tissue. He shrugged. “It’s just twelve months. Hell, if I get a job right after graduation, I’ll be able to pay off any fees from cancelling.”

Ana had eyed him. Fareeha played in the other room with Reinhardt. “If it escalates, I want you out. No arguing. You can look after Fareeha in return for the couch.”

He’d returned to his apartment grim and bandaged. Turning the TV on to block out the sound of footsteps, he curled up in a ratty chair and stared down his homework. The pages of historical dates and notes blurred, his exhausted eyes watering. The lamp’s light flickered here and there from the building’s crappy electrical work. It was dark outside, and his skin crawled, as though anticipating something evil. He closed the curtains and blinds on each window.

He knew the evil was already in the house, though. Ignoring the shadows in the corner of his eyes was the only way to deal with it. The test tomorrow took precedence over what was in his home.

A tendril of black smoke flowed down the middle of his book. Smaller, inquisitive fingers brushed over the typed words. He tried to blink it away. The darkness only thickened. When one of the smaller offshoots brushed against his hand, he flinched away, snapping the book closed. A voice echoed through the room.

“In the walls,” the voice said. Jack didn’t know if it was his. HIs heart skipped a beat, but then the world returned to motion. The shadow was gone, as was the voice. Had any of it been real? He searched his body for burn marks but found none. There were no tender bruises or cuts either.

He looked around the room, eyes narrowed. “Who are you?”

The room--the ghost--didn’t respond. He didn’t want to go to bed but his eyes ached and the notes meant nothing to his sluggish mind. He left the lamp on his side table and the one that hung from the bed’s headboard on as he slumped on to a flimsy mattress. “Don’t burn me,” he told it. “Or anything else. Just let me sleep in peace. I’ll be gone eventually.”

It came to him again that night. The shadow woke him in the dreams by touching his cheek. The skin, though, didn’t sizzle or burn. The touch was cold as winter’s wind. Jack looked up at the ghost through clear eyes. The ghost’s eyes were a sparking white. 

“In the walls,” it said. Its voice reverberated through the small room like thunder. “Look in the walls.”

Jack grabbed for the ghost’s arm. The shadowy mass rippled under his warm touch. “What are you? Who are you?"

The white eyes had no pupil. They expanded, encompassing more of the shadow-fire face. “In the wall, in the wall, in the wall,  _ in the wall _ \--” It grabbed him by the face and pulled him close. The shadow-fire stretched out to swallow him.

He woke gasping. It was six in the morning. Sweat soaked him, but something thicker and stickier covered his belly. It burned from the salt of his sweat. The cuts were shallow, though they leaked dark blood. 

IN THE WALL it said across his belly. 

The ghost had attacked. He tried to keep his breathing shallow, though his heart raced and tears pooled in his eyes. Did he have enough bandages? He inched from the bed. Movement sloshed the blood pooling in his body’s lines and dips between muscle. He got far enough to grab his phone and dialled Ana’s number.

The call didn’t go through. Neither did a call to 911. All that came across the line was a sparkling static that hurt to hear. He stumbled from bed, using a t-shirt to press against the wounds and mop up the blood. The ghost didn’t appear as he staggered to the bathroom. Alcohol cleaned the cuts, stinging and burning enough to make him gasp, and he found a roll of gauze and bandages in an old first aid kit. He wrapped it all around his middle after smearing antiseptic cream all over his torso. A safety pin helped hold it in place.

In the wall, it’d said in so many ways. Something was in the walls of his apartment. The ghost’s body? A secret to its murder? Maybe it was even a trinket that it’d loved dearly. He couldn’t just cut open the walls, though. But he looked down at his body and wondered how deep those cuts could have gone. It’d spared him worse pain. The wounds he had were deep enough to threaten worse.

He left the bathroom to clean the trail of blood he’d left from his bedroom. When he finished, he threw out the shirt and grabbed a long, sharp knife. He walked to the living room wall and began to search.


End file.
